A friend of mines birthday is coming up. I was going to get him a subscription to JAMA, but decided to get him a few back issues first to see if he liked it (subscription can wait until Christmas!).

Does anyone have any recommendations for back issues? I haven't read the Journal myself, but folks on here and other forums give it really positive reviews.

If it helps, my friend studied Aikido for about 4 years (he is taking a break from it as he runs marathons as well, and he can't fit it in at the moment). He also has an interest in traditional Koryu arts and Taijiquan. He is interested in most Asian martial arts though, so he would read about mostly anything.

Hey Prize, it's a been hectic day for me (to say the least), but I do have nearly every issue of JAMA. Honestly, if you're friend is broadly interested in M.A. history and theory etc, I think that pretty much every issue is good. At the back of the newer ones you can usually find an ad for back issues, and they all have a table of contents, so that might be a good place to start.

Here is link to the publishers website, and you can find the same info there:

Being more specific, I really enjoyed Vol. 15, No. 3, which had a cool article on optical illusion in kata, and a good article on Xing Yi. And Vol. 16 No. 1 had an interesting article on the history of the spear. There are many others that I liked, but those I recently reread, so they are fresh. I DID not like the articles on Aikido and music. I found them full of assumptions and generally unqualified remarks about what Aikido 'is', and that ruined what could have been an interesting discussion on an interesting topic.

Also, if you're going to buy a bunch, I'd wait until Christmas, because they are much, much cheaper.

--Chris

_________________________
"Seek not to follow in the footsteps of the men of old; seek what they sought."--Basho